TORONTO — Brian Johnson earned his first major league win after being called up from the minors earlier in the day, Mookie Betts hit his first home run of the season and the Boston Red Sox hung on to beat the Toronto Blue Jays 8-7 on Tuesday night for their season-high fourth straight victory.
Johnson (1-0), promoted Tuesday morning from Triple-A Pawtucket, gave up four runs and seven hits and struck out six in five innings. He lost his only other start, at Houston on July 21, 2015.
Betts, who was 3 for 5 and got the Red Sox rolling with an RBI single in the third inning, hit a drive into the second deck to lead off the seventh.
Mitch Moreland, who reached based for the 12th straight game and hit his league-leading 10th double, was 3 for 5 and drove in three runs.
Russell Martin, Justin Smoak and Ezequiel Carrera had home runs for the Blue Jays, off to a franchise-worst 2-11 start. Toronto went just 3 of 12 with runners in scoring position.
Facing an 8-4 deficit in the bottom of the ninth, the Blue Jays rallied with two outs. Steve Pearce drove Martin in with a single. Carrera then hit his first home run of the season, a two-run shot into the Blue Jays’ bullpen in left field, to make the score 8-7. But Devon Travis popped out to shortstop to end the game.
Marcus Stroman (1-2) had his shortest outing of the season, surrendering six earned runs and 11 hits before being removed in the fourth inning with two outs.
Kendrys Morales started the scoring in the first with an RBI single, and came home on Justin Smoak’s drive to the outfield fence two batters later, giving Toronto a quick 2-0 lead.
The Red Sox came right back in the third to take a 3-2 lead, before Smoak tied it at 3 with his second home run of the season.
Boston got to Stroman in the fifth, as both Hanley Ramirez and Moreland drove in runs. After Stroman left, Pablo Sandoval brought another runner home.
Martin’s first home run of the season, in the bottom of the fifth, brought the Blue Jays to within two, before Betts restored Boston’s three-run lead two innings later with a shot beyond the left-field wall.
UP NEXT
RED SOX: RHP Rick Porcello (1-1, 7.56 ERA) makes his fourth start of the season. The reigning American League Cy Young Award winner was 3-0 in five starts against Toronto last season.
BLUE JAYS: LHP Francisco Liriano (0-1, 9.00 ERA) is 2-3 with 5.97 ERA against Boston in six career starts.
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